Six Big Government Programs Conservatives Can Eliminate

Over at NetRightNation, there's a writer named Michael Swartz who says that ideological purity among conservatives would be more useful than all these summer "tea parties".  He says:

Thoughtful advocates of limited government need to make sure that the education they gain this summer doesn’t stop. The American people tend to be all for eliminating what they consider wasteful entitlements – that is, until their favorite entitlement is on the chopping block.

Just a few years ago many of the older TEA Party attendees were calling their Congressman pleading with them not to privatize Social Security. Yet, Social Security is an unsustainable entitlement and runs counter to the idea of limited Constitutional government many in the grassroots now claim to hold dear. http://netrightnation.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1251855&Itemid=105

I can certainly understand Mr. Swartz' frustration.  What's holding Republican ideologues back from ending the Federal Government is that many Republican senior citizens depend on programs like Social Security and Medicare for their food and health.  And these Republican elderly are so selfish that they prioritize their own food and health above the goal of achieving "limited government." 

As Swartz observes, it's far easier to be ideologically pure about foregoing Government programs and services that affect other people than it is to call the Social Security Administraiton and say we no longer want to participate in that big Goverment program that pays our rent and food. Swartz is right that Social Security and Medicare are big Government programs and here are six more that can be eliminated:

City and Town Fire Departments:  (Communist programs that put the government in charge of your fire safety instead of you purchasing fire extinguishing services in the free market.  It's unfair for the Government to compete with private fire extinguishing services.  Government take over of this market has smothered private enterprise that otherwise would have offered fire extinguishing insurance to those with enough money to buy it.)

Town, City and State Police Departments:  (Communist programs that put the government in charge of your safety from break-ins and car thefts instead of you purchasing police protection from private security services in the free market.  It's unfair for the Government to compete with private security services.  Government take over of this market has smothered private enterprise that otherwise would have offered cat-out-tree insurance at a prive that all of us could afford, or simply do without.  Men should not have to pay for a big Government program to catch and imprison rapists, because men are much less likely to be raped.  This is a one-size-fits all big Government program that extinguishes private entrepreneurship in the safety business.  Government should not be competing with private security guard services.) 

Public water supplies:  These are a communist scheme as well, because they make us get all of our drinking water from the Government instead of giving us a choice as to which spring water we want to bathe in a use to water our lawns.

The US Coast Guard:  Each of us should privately contract for ocean safety service insurance that we can use if our sailboats get in trouble or our plane goes down in the Hudson.  We'll just call our insurance companies and see if our Private Coast Guard Insurance covers us for fishing us out of the frigid waters of the Hudson River.  If not, we can always use the phone book to find a private contractor who will come out and get us.  That's the free market, and the Coast Guard is a big-government communist conspiracy to take away our right to decide who will fish us out of the Hudson when our planes go down.

NASA:  If we want to go to the moon, then each of us should contract with a private industry entrepreneur who can get us there.  There's no reason why the US Government should compete with private entrepreneurs in the space business.

National Aeronotic Safety Administration (Air Traffic Controllers):  The worst of all may be the National Airtraffic Controllers who have a big-government program to keep planes from smashing into one another. These air traffic controllers compete with private air traffic safety systems that might to the job much better, particularly if there were thousands of them across the country, free to do the job in their own way.  It's communism for us all to have to rely on the same big-government air traffic controllers.

The US Military and the State Department:  The most communist enterprise of the entire federal government is the national military.  We would all be safer if each of us could choose his own Secretary of State and contract with him to maintain our security from foreign threats.  This business of a "one-size-fits-all" military takes away from each of the the ability to choose the foreign policy that most meets our needs.  It's time to disband the US military and give Americans real choice as to who will protect us, using the free market to keep costs down and provide national security insurance only to those who need it.

Why not disband socialist institutions like the local police and fire departments, since these public services are competing with private firms that could do a much better job of insuring each of us against burglars and house fires.  

Personally, I feel pretty safe and I don't want the Government telling me that I have to be protected by a big-government bureaucracy like the US military.  I would prefer to have the right to hire my own body guards, but only if I want them.  This communist business of compelling ALL Americans to pay into one big-government military system is too much for me to stomach!

If the above list doesn't add up to six, the add or subtract the Food and Drug Administration.  Why should we have to pay into a government insurance company that tests food when each of us could by tests on the open market and test our food ourselves.  There's no good reason for the Federal Government to compete against private biologists who would otherwise be willing to test food for each of us before we eat it.